New MLA Handout

Image credit: trypdwyre

Thanks to Sharon A. Moore for permission to share this new Spring 2009 MLA handout: Citing Your Sources – MLA Format
.

Computer-Generated Bibliographic Citations: Can Machines Get It Right?

For decades we have been trying to get computers to correctly format bibliographic citations. Can machines get it right? Some programming is now doing a good job, but any machine-generated citation should be checked for accuracy, as tweaking is sometimes required.

Computer-Generated Bibliographic Citations is a brief tutorial (PDF format, 130KB, 13 slides) which covers why citation is important, compares formatting in a few bibliographic styles (APA, MLA, CHICAGO, CSE, NLM, AFS), lists a few programs which generate citations, and compares machine-generated citation accuracy for APA citations generated by WorldCat and Zotero.

Zotero : akin to Bibliographic Heaven

Image credit:
60 in 3





Zotero (rivaling sliced bread in my world) provides free bibliographic reference management through the Firefox browser. A Zotero tutorial is available here .

Google Books vs. Peninsula College Library Catalog

Don Quijote
Image Credit: [noone]

"La libertad, Sancho, es uno de los más preciosos dones que a los hombres dieron los cielos; con ella no pueden igualarse los tesoros que encierran la tierra y el mar: por la libertad, así como por la honra, se puede y debe aventurar la vida."

-Don Quijote de la Mancha-

A Response to: “Google Books vs. BISON”
http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6566451.html

An article by Mark J. Ludwig & Margaret R. Wells in Library Journal (6/15/2008) says: “…Google Books' deeper indexing and more advanced relevancy ranking usually works better than that of our local catalogs.”

I respectfully disagree.

Google Books often cannot even compete with our small, rural, community college library catalog (with 62,000 holdings) when the playing field is level, i.e., when the search parameters are identical.

In the last century (the 20th century) I remember studying at the University of Washington, consulting the catalog, climbing the stairs of Suzzallo Library, and pulling books out of the stacks. I did that daily for years. I had the full-text in my hands minutes after a catalog search. I was in heaven. Now, in 2008, Google Books cannot even come close to giving me the full-text I want.

Whereas for most search results with Google Books you do not get the full-text to read, in a library you do get full text of e-books (and more full text in print sources, along with some exercise, if you walk to the stacks).

Google Books default is “All Books,” which includes "full view" and "limited preview" books. To make the comparison of immediate full text accessibility more accurate, the “full view only” option should be selected in Google Advanced Book Search. The Peninsula College Library catalog often does better than Google Advanced Book Search "full view only."

Recently I was searching for books on leadership and did a Google Books search for books in English, published between 2000 and 2008, with the word “leadership” in the title. I wanted recent books, and access to full text, and I did a title keyword search to insure relevancy, since I wasn’t interested in items found by Google Books with the word “leadership” mentioned once on page 153. I repeated the identical search in the Peninsula College Library catalog.

A Peninsula College Library Catalog search retrieved more titles than a Google Books "full view only" search: 22 times more! For students in the PC Library all books are "full view." Some are e-books immediately available online (those reported below in the searches), and additional print sources require a few minutes walk to the stacks.

I then tried other topics using the same search parameters. PC Library contained more "full view" e-books than Google Books (full view only) on many of the topics searched.

Searches in both sources used identical parameters: title keyword search for books in English published between 2000 and 2008. Here is my search history:

LEADERSHIP
Peninsula College Library Catalog = 179 full-view e-books
Google Advanced Book Search = 8 full-view titles

Hmmm… Google Books "full view only" did not do well, when compared to Peninsula College Library Catalog, to get immediate access to full text.

Maybe that was a fluke. Let’s try another search for the word “globalization” in the title.

GLOBALIZATION
Peninsula College Library Catalog = 130 full-view e-books
Google Advanced Book Search = 5 full-view titles

Maybe they were both flukes. Let’s try another…

PHILOSOPHY
Peninsula College Library Catalog = 220 full-view e-books
Google Advanced Book Search = 3 full-view titles

Ouch!

Let's try a couple more...

COMPUTER
Peninsula College Library Catalog = 152 full-view e-books
Google Advanced Book Search = 4 full-view titles

PSYCHOANALYSIS
Peninsula College Library Catalog = 22 full-view e-books
Google Advanced Book Search = 0 full-view titles

Not only does our small Peninsula College Library frequently have more titles to offer students than Google Books, the quality of our copyrighted offerings are likely superior, coming from academic publisher content, content which Google Books cannot provide in full text due to copyright restrictions.

Topics like leadership, philosophy, psychoanalysis, computers, and globalization are not esoteric, yet Google Book Search delivers from zero to five percent of the number of titles available in the Peninsula College Library Catalog. I would say that is an accurate reflection of the real world, since Google has digitized less than 10% of the 86 million unique titles in WorldCat, titles that are available in libraries. Anyone limiting themselves to Google Book Search will miss more than 90% of the literature in existence.

Additionally, if a student does a default Google Books search (this frequently happens), instead of an advanced search with limiters, he or she would have to wade through the no-preview titles (no full-text), the “limited preview” titles (peek-a-boo full-text), the books published before 1920 and public domain books (not copyrighted), and the books in languages other than English, to find recent full-text titles in English (if Google Books has any).

Peninsula College Library does deliver the full-text. And, for the 30,000 e-books in our collection, students in the library don’t even have to go to the stacks... and even more full-text is available in print monographs after a short walk to the stacks.

Now, if a student wanted to find books to request on interlibrary loan, then a default Google Books search might be useful (although I would go with WorldCat, which has records for millions more documents: books, articles, theses, etc., and more search options, than Google Books).

For our students I think the Peninsula College Library is their best bet to retrieve full text, and WorldCat is best to identify titles for interlibrary loan that Google Books does not have.

Peninsula College Library is small but mighty… you might say it is a Google Books slayer.

EBSCO Literary Reference Center Available to PC Academic Community with NOLS Library Card

Shakespeare

Image credit: richardk


Members of the Peninsula College academic community have access to EBSCO's Literary Reference Center, but they will need to authenticate with a North Olympic Library System (NOLS) library card.

The EBSCO Literary Reference Center (LRC) describes itself this way: The primary goal of LRC is to assist high school and undergraduate English and Humanities students with homework and research assignments of a literary nature.

The LRC contains a Literary-Historical Timeline, Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature, an LRC Glossary, plot summaries, reviews, interviews, etc. LRC is a comprehensive source that combines information from over 1,000 books and monographs, major literary encyclopedias and reference works, hundreds of literary journals.

Get a NOLS library card and get access to a wealth of literary information!

Peninsula College Library also has several periodical databases with literary criticism listed on its Online Resources page: Academic Search Premier, Magill on Literature, Gale Literary Databases (which includes the Dictionary of Literary Biography, Contemporary Authors, and Contemporary Literary Criticism Select), Gale Literary Index, ProQuest and eLibrary. EBSCO's LRC nicely complements PC Library's literary resources and a link to LRC is available through the Peninsula College Library Cyberlinks page under LANGUAGE.

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

"crumbs"
Image credit: boadiceafairy





Here is an article from The Atlantic Monthly I enjoyed reading...... leisurely... in a comfortable stuffed chair... with a cup of hot mint tea... and a reading light... as the rain pitter-pattered on the roof:

Is Google Making Us Stupid?
by Nicholas Carr.
The Atlantic Monthly, July/August 2008:56-63

At the risk of giving away the answer, here are two sentences from the article:

“Most of the proprietors of the commercial Internet have a financial stake in collecting the crumbs of data we leave behind as we flit from link to link — the more crumbs, the better. The last thing these companies want is to encourage leisurely reading or slow, concentrated thought. It’s in their economic interest to drive us to distraction.”

I had the print edition in hand, but here is a link (wink) to the online edition: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/google

CQ Researcher Adds Index to Pro/Con Positions on Issues

You can now browse Congressional Quarterly Researcher pro/con statements by topics (pro/con statements present opposing viewpoints on issues). The link to the Congressional Quarterly Researcher is on the Library Online Resources page. Off campus access requires authentication with your PC 895 ID number. To give an idea of the breadth of coverage, here is a list of pro/con topics currently available:

Abortion
Adoption and Foster Care
Advertising
Affirmative Action
Afghanistan and Pakistan
Africa
AIDS/HIV and Sexually Transmitted Diseases
Air Pollution
Air Transportation
Alternative Energy
Alternative Medicine
Alzheimer's Disease
America's Image Abroad
Animal Rights
Antitrust
Aquaculture and Maritime Policy
Archeology
Arms Control and Disarmament
Arms Sales and Trafficking
Artificial Intelligence
Arts
Automobiles
Baby Boomers
Banking
Bilingual Education and ESL
Birth Control
Campaign Finance
Canada
Cancer
Caribbean
Censorship
Census
Chain Stores
Challenges of the Courts
Cheating and Ethics in Schools
Child Abuse
Child Care
Child Labor
China
Christianity
Civil Liberties in Wartime
Coal Industry
Coastlines
College Financing
College Sports
Colleges and Universities
Computers
Consumer Protection
Copyright and Patents
Corporate Salaries
Cosmetics and Fashion
Cost of Living and Wages
Credit and Consumer Debt
Crime
Criminal Sentencing
Cuba
Death Penalty
Defense Spending
Democracy
Disabled Persons
Disasters and Preparedness
Disease
Diversity
Doctors
Drug Abuse and Trafficking
Education and Funding
Education and Gender
Education Issues
Education Standards and Testing
Elections
Electoral College
Energy
Environmental Protection
Ethics in Government
Ethics in War
European Unification
Evolution, Science, and Creationism
Executive Powers and the Presidency
Farm Labor
Farm Loans and Subsidies
Farm Policy
Federal Budget and National Debt
Federal Judiciary
Federal/State Government Relations
Food Safety
Foreign Aid
Gambling and Lotteries
Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered Individuals
Genetics and Cloning
Gifted Education and Tracking
Government Secrecy
Gun Control and the Second Amendment
Health Insurance
Highways and Roads
Hispanics
Historic Preservation
Holocaust and Antisemitism
Hospitals
Housing
Human Rights
Illiteracy
Immigration and Naturalization
India
Insurance Industry
Intelligence Agencies
Iran
Iraq
Islam
Israel, Palestine, and Middle East Peace
Japan
Jobs and Skills
Journalism, Newspapers, and the Media
Jury System
Juveniles and the Justice System
Korea
Labor Unions
Latin America
Law Enforcement
Lawyers
Learning Disabilities
Libraries
Lobbying and Special Interests
Marijuana
Marriage, Divorce, and Single Parents
Mass Transit
Medicaid and Medicare
Medical Malpractice
Mental Health
Military Draft
Millenium
Missile Defense
Morality and Values
Music
National Parks
Native Americans
NATO
Nuclear Power
Nutrition and Health
Occult
Oil and Gasoline Prices
Older Americans and Senior Citizens
Olympics
Organ Transplants
Organized Crime
Panama
Peace Corps, National Service, and Volunteerism
Pensions and Retirement
Pesticides
Pharmaceuticals
Philanthropy and Charities
Political Parties
Polling
Population
Poverty and Homelessness
Presidential Candidates and Campaigns
Prisons
Privacy
Privatization
Professional Sports
Property Rights
Protest Movements and Counter Culture
Public Housing
Public Utilities and Electricity
Publishing Industry
Puerto Rico
Racism and Hate
Radio
Railroads
Reapportionment, Redistricting, and Representation
Refugees and Asylum
Religion and Politics
Religion and Schools
Right to Die
Rural America
Russia and the Soviet Union
Science Policy
Segregation and Desegregation
Sex Education
Sex Offenders
Sexual Behavior
Smoking and the Tobacco Industry
Social Security
Space Exploration
State and Local Governments
Stock Market
Stress
Supreme Court
Taxation
Teaching
Teens and Alcohol
Telecommunications
Television
Term Limits
Terrorism
Tourism and Vacation
Traffic Congestion
Trash and Recycling
U.S. Dollar and Inflation
U.S. Military
UFO's
Underground Economy
Unemployment
United Kingdom
United Nations
United States and Foreign Trade
Upward Mobility
Urban Planning
Vaccines
Vietnam War
Violence in America
Violence in Schools
Voting Rights
Washington, DC
Water Pollution
Weapons of Mass Destruction
Welfare
Wildlife and Endangered Species
Women and Sports
Women and Work
Women's Health
Women's Rights
Workforce Protections
World Trade
World War II Reparations
Youths and Work

Peninsula College Library "Bestsellers"

Image credit: El Ramon


Here is a list of the 15 titles with the highest circulation in the Peninsula College Library for the 2007-2008 academic year:

Telling true stories : a nonfiction writers' guide from the Nieman Foundation at Harvard University / edited by Mark Kramer and Wendy Call.

Buffalo for the Broken Heart : restoring life to a Black Hills ranch / Dan O'Brien.

Bedford introduction to literature : reading, thinking, writing / [edited by] Michael Meyer.

Human physiology / Stuart Ira Fox.

Where I'm calling from : new and selected stories / Raymond Carver.

Baseball saved us / written by Ken Mochizuki ; illustrated by Dom Lee.

Make way for ducklings, by Robert McCloskey.

Fundamentals of nursing / Patricia A. Potter, Anne Griffin Perry.

Latin for people = Latina pro populo / Alexandri Humez, Nicholas Humez.

Precalculus, annotated instructor's edition : functions and graphs / Earl W. Swokowski, Jeffery A. Cole.

Pre-code Hollywood : sex, immorality, and insurrection in American cinema, 1930-1934 / Thomas Doherty.

Spunk & bite : a writer's guide to punchier, more engaging language & style / Arthur Plotnik.

Surviving schizophrenia : a manual for families, consumers, and providers / E. Fuller Torrey.

Hiroshima no pika / words and pictures by Toshi Maruki.

Puss in boots / Charles Perrault ; illustrated by Fred Marcellino ; translated by Malcolm Arthur.

University Channel Provides Access to Academic Thought

Image credit:
israfel67

The UChannel (also known as the University Channel) makes videos of academic lectures and events from all over the world available to the public. It is a place where academics can air their ideas and present research in a full-length, uncut format. Contributors with greater video production capabilities can submit original productions.

The UChannel presents ideas in a way commercial news or public affairs programming cannot. Because it is neither constrained by time nor dependent upon commercial feedback, the UChannel's video content can be broad and flexible enough to cover the full gamut of academic investigation.

UChannel is a project of Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

Library Tutorial Presentations Available

Image credit:
Lukethelibrarian


The library is inaugurating a new page with library tutorials at http://faculty.pc.ctc.edu/davidk/Default.aspx. The tutorials are in PDF format.

Here is a list of the available tutorials:

ONLINE CATALOG (OPAC)

What Is An OPAC?
(and what does it do?)

OPAC-Search-Limiters
(using Quick Limiters and Set Limits Button)

OPAC-Advanced-Search
(truncation, Boolean, and field search)

ONLINE RESOURCES (Library databases)

A-to-Z e-Journal Index
(to 9,000 full-text e-journal subscriptions)

RESEARCH PROCESS

Forming a Research Question

SEARCH TACTICS

Finding Search Terms

Forming a Research Question

DOCUMENTATION

Zotero : Documenting Your Research

Biblio Snapshot of Sustainability Articles, 1986-2007

Articles with “sustainability” in the article title.
Data source: WorldCat.org
Date of search: April 16, 2008

2007 ... 1282
2006 ... 1226
2005 ... 1063
2004 ... 1022
2003 ... 1009
2002 ... 854
2001 ... 721
2000 ... 721
1999 ... 689
1998 ... 591
1997 ... 508
1996 ... 452
1995 ... 378
1994 ... 242
1993 ... 121
1992 ... 45
1991 ... 20
1990 ... 13
1989 ... 6
1988 ... 2
1987 ... 2
1986 ... 1

Databases with Environmental Sciences Information in Peninsula College Library

Image credit:
Beatriz Giraldo

The following databases are available through the "Online Resources" link on the Library home page:

Environment Complete
1,772,000 records from more than 1,500 domestic and international titles going back to the 1940s (including 1,094 active core titles). Full text for more than 600 journals, including many of the most used journals in the discipline, such as Environment (back to 1975), Ecologist, Conservation Biology, etc. Additionally, Environment Complete provides full text for more than 100 monographs. Some of the areas covered include:

Agriculture
Energy
Natural resources
Urban planning
Renewable energy sources
Geography
Marine & freshwater science
Social impacts
Environmental technology
Public policy
Environmental law
Ecosystem ecology
Pollution & waste management

Academic Search Premier
8,200 journals, magazines, newspapers, trade publications indexed. Of those 4,500 are journals, with full-text provided in HTML or PDF. Of those 3,700 are peer-reviewed. Of those 1,000 have PDF backfiles back to 1975. Some of the areas covered include:

Agriculture & Irrigation
Economics
Biological Sciences
Education
Environmental Studies
Electronics
Geography
Mathematics
Marine Sciences
Physics

ProQuest
3,000 journals, magazines, newspapers, trade publications indexed. Of those 850 are peer-reviewed. Backfiles vary, mostly from 1980s on.

Agriculture
Biology
Chemistry
Computers
Engineering
Physics

eLibrary
2,000 full-text publications, including magazines, newspapers, books, television/radio transcripts, maps, pictures, audio/visual clips, and educator-approved websites from Homework Central®

Experiments
Science Project Ideas
Featured Scientists
Mathematics
Life Sciences (Biology)
Health
Physical Sciences
Technology

Ebrary Academic Complete
30,000 E-Book titles from more than 220 of the worlds leading academic, STM (scientific, technical, medical), and professional publishers.

Earth Sciences
Physical Resources
Biosphere
Biological Resources
Environmental Management

GreenFILE
Scholarly and general interest titles, as well as government documents and reports. Abstracting and indexing for more than 600 titles, including comprehensive coverage for core titles. Total of 295,000 records with 4,600 full-text.

Global warming
Recycling
Alternate fuel sources
Biodiversity
Environmental Sciences
Ecosystems

CQ Researcher
Single-themed, 12,000-word reports, each providing an introductory overview; background and chronology on the topic; an assessment of the current situation; tables and maps; pro/con statements from representatives of opposing positions; and bibliographies of key sources.

Jobs Vs. Environment
Environmental Justice
Population & Environment
Climate Change
Regulating Pesticides
Air Pollution Conflict
Disappearing Species
Oil Spills
Energy & Environment
Electric Cars

McGraw-Hill’s Access Science Encyclopedia of Science & Technology Online
8,500 online articles, 110,000+ definitions, 15,000 illustrations and graphics, and bibliographies containing more than 28,000 literature citations, biographies of more than 2,000 well-known scientists from the Hutchinson Dictionary of Scientific Biography®, and continuously updated, fully-searchable, media-rich content, terms, images & videos.

Environmental Science
Conservation
Animal Ecology
Ecolology, General
Ecosystem
Plant Ecology
Agriculture, Forestry & Soils
Mathematics
General Science & Tecnology
Physics

Oxford Reference
Fully-indexed, cross-searchable dictionary, language reference, and subject reference works published by Oxford University Press, including detailed information from titles in the Oxford Companions Series.
175+ titles representing all subject areas. Here are a few titles of language and subject dictionaries:

The Oxford Companion to the Earth
A Dictionary of Ecology
A Dictionary of Environment and Conservation
Dictionary of Geography

PC Library Career Information Pathfinder Now Available

Image credit: andyburnfield

There are many ways to locate career information at the PC Library. Career information can be found in circulating books (which may be checked out of the library), e-books (which can be read online), reference books (available for in-library use only), Internet Web sites, and magazine or newspaper articles in ProQuest, an electronic periodical index offering the full-text of local and national newspapers. Link to the pathfinder here: Career Information Pathfinder 2008

Library Provides Access to Washington State Newspapers

Photo credit, with some rights reserved through a Creative Commons license, "Dead Sea newspaper" by inju



Through the ProQuest database, with generous help from the Washington State Library, the Peninsula College Library provides access to eighteen (18) Washington State newspapers:

Columbian
Daily News; Longview, Wash.
Eastside Journal
Herald, The; Everett, Wash.
Journal of Business; Spokane
Mercer Island Reporter
News Tribune, The
Peninsula Daily News
Puget Sound Business Journal
Seattle Post - Intelligencer
Seattle Times
South County Journal
Spokesman Review
Sun, The; Bremerton, Wash.
Tri - City Herald
Valley Daily News
Wenatchee World
Yakima Herald - Republic

PC Library Presents at OPAEYC Conference

Photo Credit: Some rights reserved through a Creative Commons license by Travelin' Librarian




The Olympic Peninsula Association for the Education of Young Children (OPAEYC) held its 15th Annual Early Childhood Conference (co-sponsored by the Peninsula College Early Childhood Education Program). The theme of the conference was "Building for the Future."

The Peninsula College Library provided a "Mountain Workshop" titled, "Tactics and Tips to Find Quality ECE Resources." The 90-minute session was well-attended and covered "tried and true time-saving strategies to find and evaluate quality ECE information resources; differences between Web and database searching and tactics used in each; how to distinguish popular and scholarly sources; and how to evaluate any information source for quality."

Attendees received a handout on ECE resource links and performed a hands-on search exercise to find one popular and one scholarly source in order to identify and compare their features. The session contributed towards Stars Competency: Professionalism & Administration.

One interesting point of the presentation showed how the development of the early childhood education field from invisible college to national organization parallels the development of the early childhood education literature, based upon a quick and dirty bibliometric analysis of WorldCat holdings:

< 10 ..... 1800 to 1927 ..... (NANE 1929)
< 20 ..... 1928 to 1959 ..... (*OMEP 1948)
< 100 ..... 1963 to 1967 ..... (NAEYC 1964)
< 1000 ..... 1968 to 1988 ..... (**UNESCO 1981-89)
< 2000 ..... 1989 to 2007

From 1800 to 1927 there were an average of fewer than ten publications per year. From 1928 to 1959 the average number of annual publications was fewer than 20 titles per year, etc. The peak year, in terms of ECE publications, was 2000 with 2,434 publications. Data comes from a search of WorldCat.org on March 14, 2008.

*OMEP = World Organization for Early Childhood Education 1948 (Organisation Mondiale pour l’Education Préscolaire)
**UNESCO coined the term "Early Childhood Care and Education" in 1981.

CLAMS Meeting a Huge Success!

Photo: noshowerfamily on Flickr

Peninsula College Library attended the CLAMS 2008 Spring Conference in Spokane, Washington. (CLAMS stands for College Librarians and Media Specialists of Washington State) The conference was well-attended and the presentations were excellent!

Here is a very brief summary (exceedingly brief):

The first presenter was Michael Porter, aka Libraryman, who discussed Gadgets in a most entertaining way. Gadgets discussed were both of a hardware and software nature. Here are a few:

Sling Media Box
Chumby
Bugbox
Vocera
Webjunction
Koha
Vudu
Apple TV
Creative Commons
Direct TV Sat-Go

Will Stuivenga from the Washington State Library gave a very informative presentation on the Washington State Catalog project. Launch of the new catalog is expected to be March 31, 2008 and Peninsula College Library is one of the 23 community and technical colleges involved in Phase One. One cool feature of the new catalog, which is not available on WorldCat.org, will be the ability to view local, regional and global resources through "regional scopes" or "type of library scopes" (including LVIS WA!)

There was a presentation of a ProQuest tutorial by Nancy Koffey of Spokane Community College and a presentation by Kitty Mackey of Clark College on Iris42 (the Iris42draft version can be seen at: http://libreeze.com/iris/index.shtml ) Iris is the Information & Research Instruction Suite. (42 is "for two-year colleges" and coincidentally Washington State was the 42nd state admitted to the union.)

All in all, every presentation was enjoyable, every presenter was delightful, and the CLAMS 2008 Spring Conference succeeded beyond all my expectations.

Brainstorming on Epistemological Pluralism

Source: Formless Mountain (by Steve Self) Credits: Ken Wilber, Don Beck.

Towards an Integral Curriculum for General Education:
A Brainstorm of Ideas for an Epistemologically Plural Curriculum

Recently at Peninsula College there has been some discussion of "whole education" and discussion of promoting and modeling "diversity" and "pluralism." The following are some thoughts on epistemological pluralism as related to the Peninsula College Mission.

The Peninsula College Mission states as a goal for students:

Peninsula College provides educational opportunities in the areas of academic transfer, professional/technical, basic skills, and continuing education. The College also contributes to the cultural and economic enrichment of Clallam and Jefferson Counties.

In the document, "50 Hours: A Core Curriculum for College Students" (1989), Lynne Cheney references the injunction to "Know thyself," which, I believe, is important to the definition of student success. Self-recognition permits self-value and reaching of one's potential.

Education means realizing the potential we have inside, to make manifest our capacity to know the world. The word “educate” comes from the Latin “educere” meaning “to bring out”. The task of educators is to provide learning opportunities to enable students to realize all dimensions of their being.

According to the perennial philosophy (Huxley, 1945) human beings have at least three dimensions: body, mind and spirit, what has traditionally been called the “great chain of being.” (Lovejoy, 1936). We have the potential to realize what each aspect of our being offers because each level of being has its own cognitive instrument appropriate to the data of its level. To use the terminology of St. Bonaventure, we investigate the sensorimotor world with the eye of flesh, the rational world with the eye of mind and the spiritual world with the eye of contemplation (Wilber, 1998). The sensorimotor world offers the exquisite beauty of natural data and the pleasure of physical movement and health. The rational world offers the enjoyment of thinking and learning, of reading and sharing the knowledge of an author we have never met. The spiritual world offers us the pure delight of a silent mind, the peace and sublime ecstasy that comes with being in harmony with the universe, and the wisdom that is the fruition of self-knowledge.

We realize our highest potential by knowing how to utilize each of our cognitive instruments to explore what each level of being offers. Realization of student potential mandates us to teach the means to explore and enjoy each aspect of being. In the sensorimotor world students learn to care for the ecology and care for their own bodies, thereby enjoying a pleasant environment and good health. In the rational world students analyze and resolve problems, learn and enjoy through reading, thereby experiencing the pleasures of the mind. In the spiritual world students discover silence and bliss, the hidden treasures of their own inner world.

The exploration of each level of being with the appropriate cognitive instrument is epistemological pluralism. Educators should promote epistemological pluralism to realize plenitude of being. We now offer the opportunity to develop the body and mind, but we do not offer spiritual science. We should integrate spiritual exploration into the curriculum, using the eye of contemplation. We need to include practical exercises for exploration of our inner world, to fulfill the injunction: "Know thyself."

Besides the satisfaction that comes from personal growth, epistemological pluralism results in increased tolerance and a broader integral vision, indispensable elements for the resolution of the global problems we face in the 21st century. To solve our problems we need more than just brain-power: we need intelligence infused with love. Love and compassion are the fruit of spiritual realization.

Our curriculum (although a bit Eurocentric) is doing a good job of addressing the physical and rational worlds. These curricular notes I offer try to be more inclusive, addressing the neglected spiritual world. What follows is a brainstorm of ideas that does not pretend to be exhaustive. This curriculum is not dogmatic or ideological, nor is it a “new age” curriculum. My intent is to present a more balanced approach that rescues traditional knowledge and is oriented toward the development of a rich spiritual life. I believe our curriculum should take advantage of the legacy of wealth that humanity has left us from centuries of experimentation in the spiritual world. I include the Judeo-Christian tradition as well as other non-Christian sources of inspiration.

An integral, pluralistic curriculum directed toward development of the whole being, including the spiritual level, might include the following:

PHYSICAL EDUCATION
• Teaching of sports that can be practiced all your life, instead of sports like softball that are not played all your life and are only played after long periods of inactivity.

• Movement education where students explore the movement processes involved in throwing, stretching, jumping and running with the focus on the joy of movement.

• Centering activities that utilize fantasy, relaxation, active meditation and body awareness. For example, the active meditations of Osho, or traditional movement meditations like Tai Chi, plus martial arts like Aikido, or the stretching of Hatha Yoga.

THE SCIENCES (biology, chemistry, physics)
• Research activities to teach the scientific method inside and outside the laboratory.

MATHEMATICS
• All kinds of mathematics including logic and the study of the lives of famous mathematicians.

ART
• Presentation of art of the soul that serves as a support for contemplation, for example the traditional Tibetan “thangka”, painting that represents the potential we have in the spiritual world. Art that brings transcendence.

MUSIC
• Study of the different musical traditions that support the eye of contemplation, the history of transpersonal music, sacred sound, divine singing in various religious traditions, for example the “zikr” of the Sufis.

FOREIGN LANGUAGES
• Every student should become functionally bilingual through the study of at least one language other than English. Learning other languages provides a window into other cultures, facilitating communication with, and learning from, other another culture.

LITERATURE
Should include works from western and eastern traditions related to mystical experience. The curriculum already includes western titles and titles from the Judeo-Christian tradition. Titles from other traditions could be added. For example, here are some titles from the orient:

• CHINA: The Book of Changes, Chang Tzu, Tao Te King.

• INDIA: Hymns of the Rig Veda, Dhammapada, Vedanta Sutras, Patanjali Sutras, Osho, Bhagavad Gita, biographies of Indian mystics.

• JAPAN: Haiku Poetry, Basho, Zen literature, etc.

• ISLAM: The Koran, Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi, and many more!

Study of works from the "Eastern canon" (Sardar, 2004) including, for example, these 20 books:

The Conference of the Birds / Farid ud-Din Attar (1177)
India / Al-Beruni (c. 1030)
The Analects / Confucius (c. 400 BCE)
An Autobiography / Mohandas Gandhi (1927)
Deliverance from Error / Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (c. 1100)
The Secrets of the Self / Muhammad Iqbal (1915)
The Tale of the Heike / Kakuichi (1371)
The Recognition of Sakuntala (c. 300?)
An Introduction to History / Ibn Khaldun (1377)
The Dao De Jing / Lao Tzu (c. 400 BCE)
The Lotus Sutra (290)
The Mahabharata (400? BCE)
The Book of Mencius / Mencius (c. 330 BCE)
The Tale of Genji / Murasaki Shikibu (c. 1000)
The Masnavi / Jalaluddin Rumi (c. 1250)
The Incoherence of the Incoherence / Ibn Rushd (c. 1150)
The Pillow Book / Sei Shonagon (c. 966)
The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night (850)
The Upanishads (1600? BCE)
Essays in Idleness / Yoshida Kenko (c. 1300)

PHILOSOPHY
Study of the perennial philosophy, The Great Chain of Being, Ananda Coomaraswamy, Rene Guenon, Fritjof Shuon, Nicholas Berdyaev, Michael Murphy, Roger Walsh, Seyyed Nasr, Lex Hixon, Kant, Paul Davies, Plotinus, Aurobindo, Plato, Padmasambhava, Lady Tsogyal, Osho, Asanga, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Shankara, Chih-I, C.G. Jung, Ken Wilber and many more.

HISTORY
Too often the study of Western civilization assumes it has been responsible for its own development and does not acknowledge its debt to previous Eastern and Islamic civilizations, for example, printing (China, 1040), movable-type press (Korea, 1403), liberal humanism and institutions of higher learning (from the Muslim world), the industrial revolution (which began in China), etc. We need to include contributions and recognize influences from other parts of the world: Russia, Turkey, Scandanavia, as well as Africa, Asia, the Americas, and Oceania, departing from the dominant view (from Toynbee to Huntington) that civilizations are internally coherent and self-enclosed entities. Books that challenge the traditional story of Europe should be studied, for example, Kenneth Pomeranz's The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy; J. M. Hobson's The Eastern Origin of Civilisation, and C. A. Bayly's The Birth of the Modern World. (Haberman & Shubert, 2005).


RELIGION
Study of the beliefs and history of Christianity, the life of Jesus, Christian saints and mystics like Thomas Merton, Saint Teresa de Avila, Jacob Boehme, Meister Eckhart, Brother Lawrence, Julian de Norwich, Catherine of Siena, San Agustine, Origen, Hildegaard, Saint Francis of Asis, Juan de la Cruz and many more.

Study of other religious traditions and philosophers such as Hinayana, Mahayana, Vajrayana, Hasidim, Kabbalah, Vedas, Shankara, Ramana Maharishi, Osho, Plato, Plotinus, Vedanta, meditative Taoism, Neo-Confucianism, Sufi meditation, Zen Buddhism, al-Hallaj, Gautama Buddha, Rumi, Bal Shem Tov, Ken Wilber, and many more.

Practice of direct spiritual experience through Christian contemplation, Tai Chi, active meditations of Osho, martial arts, the 112 traditional Hindu meditations, divine singing from various traditions, sacred sounds, transpersonal dance, breathing, yoga, etc.


SOCIAL STUDIES
Pre-modern, modern and post-modern movements and their cultural implications for social and cultural development. The study of political leaders who showed a mystical consciousness, such as Mahatma Gandhi or Ashoka (265 - 238 BCE). If a significant number of persons reach levels of personal development higher than the norm in the society, how would that affect the democratic institutions, educational policies, our economies? How would it affect the practice of medicine, law, government, politics?



BIBLIOGRAPHY

CHENEY, LYNNE V. 50 Hours: A Core Curriculum for College Students. Washington, D.C. : National Endowment for the Humanities


HABERMAN, ARTHUR & SHUBERT, ADRIAN. The Teaching of European History: The Next Task. American Historical Association Perspectives, October 2005.


HOBSON, JOHN. Eastern Origins of Western Civilization. London: Cambridge, 2004.

John Hobson challenges the ethnocentric bias of mainstream accounts of the Rise of the West. It is often assumed that since Ancient Greek times Europeans have pioneered their own development, and that the East has been a passive by-stander in the story of progressive world history. Hobson argues that there were two processes that enabled the Rise of the ‘Oriental West’. First, each major developmental turning point in Europe was informed in large part by the assimilation of Eastern inventions (e.g. ideas, technologies and institutions) which diffused from the more advanced East across the Eastern-led global economy between 500–1800. Second, the construction of European identity after 1453 led to imperialism, through which Europeans appropriated many Eastern resources (land, labour and markets). Hobson’s book thus propels the hitherto marginalised Eastern peoples to the forefront of the story of progress in world history.

• Provides a fresh non-racist account of the Rise of the West

• Rethinks the essential categories, concepts and assumptions of world history

• This is the first book to explore the role of identity in world historical development
http://www.cambridge.org/uk/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=0521547245

HUXLEY, ALDOUS. The Perennial Philosophy. 2nd ed. New York: Harper, 1945.


LOVEJOY, ARTHUR. The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1936.


SARDAR, ZIAUDDIN. Written Out of History. New Statesman, Nov. 8, 2004.


WILBER, KEN. The Marriage of Sense and Soul: Integrating Science and Religion. New York: Random House, 1998.

Sustainability : A Bibliography of Books and e-Books in the Peninsula College Library

The three fingers are the sustainability symbol (photo by dragonpreneur) representing Society, Environment, and Economy.

Peninsula College is embarking on a campaign for environmental sustainability that will both teach and model value for the natural environment. This bibliography is to help identify best practices in higher education, through identifying resources related to sustainability in the Peninsula College Library.

The Sustainability bibliography is limited to monographic works (both print and electronic books) which have been published in the 21st century and are available in the Peninsula College Library collection.

Note that access to electronic books is only available remotely to students (and staff) of Peninsula College. On-campus access is available to non-students.

What is Research? (a 3-minute tutorial)

“What is Research?” , a 3-minute tutorial by William Badke, presents a model for viewing research as a problem-solving task.

Here are a couple of quotes from the tutorial:

“A great deal of what passes for student research these days is just a process of gathering data, synthesizing it, and reporting what you have found….

The goal of research is not to compile and report on information but to use information as a tool to solve a problem or deal with an issue.”

This three-minute tutorial may help viewers better understand research.

(The tutorial is housed at a trustworthy site at the University of Calgary and can be opened without fear of viruses.)

"What is Research?"

Early Childhood Education Research Guide Available

...and a little love goes a long, long way in an early childhood setting.
--Photo from Children At Risk Foundation – CARF (www.carfweb.net)

The Early Childhood Education Research Guide includes selected Peninsula College Library reference books, a section on controlled vocabularies (LCSH and ERIC), and links to library catalogs and indexes.

Employers Value Research Skills Promoted by Information Competency Instruction

Information Literacy has often been characterized as "learning how to learn". The goal is to promote independent learners capable of self-direction who can navigate through the seas of information to fish out (find and evaluate) relevant information from the global knowledge ocean in order to solve a problem or deal with an issue.

For example, most scholarly sources are copyrighted. They are not available in full-text on the "free Web" using a search engine. Most scholarly materials are only available in and through libraries, in the print and electronic resources libraries contain. Students need to know how to find scholarly sources, sources which have been evaluated for quality, such as journal articles and monographs.

A new survey of 301 employers, How Should Colleges Assess And Improve Student Learning? (dated Jan. 9, 2008, released Jan. 22, 2008) was conducted by Peter D. Hart Research Associates on behalf of the Association of American Colleges and Universities. The survey found that, of 10 skills desired by employers, only 23% of new graduates were "very well prepared" with respect to "Self-direction" and only 18% were "very well prepared" with respect to "Global knowledge". (p. 3)

Complex projects requiring information competency, such as writing research papers or maintaining electronic portfolios, are forms of authentic assessment valued by a majority of the employers. Only 5% of the employers ranked multiple choice tests as an effective means of assessment.

The only assessment that receives low scores from the majority of employers is the idea of requiring college students to complete multiple-choice tests of general content knowledge.

These findings affirm the importance of including authentic assessment in college education, through projects which require information competency. Research, which information competency skills facilitate, is a complex process of planning, finding quality sources, reading, thinking, and writing. Writing research papers is one form of authentic assessment of student learning. Research papers are a way to both promote and assess the student information competency skills which employers value.

The survey of employers was conducted between November 8 and Dec. 12, 2007 and has a margin of error of +/- 5.7 percentage points.

Report on "Google Generation" Confirms Computer Literacy Is Not Information Literacy

The report, Information Behaviour of the Researcher of the Future, dated 11 January 2008, was commissioned by the British Library.

The findings confirm what OCLC found in June 2002 in its OCLC White Paper on the Information Habits of College Students about the "Google Generation" (those born after 1993). Students think of libraries as places for books and are not familiar with, nor competent in the use of, library digital resources.

Students start their search on the Web, but the amount of time spent viewing e-books and e-journal articles (four and eight minutes, respectively) indicates they are not evaluating or even reading what they find. As the report states: "It almost seems that they go online to avoid reading in the traditional sense." (p. 10)

Each finding in the study is accompanied by a confidence level rating. For example, in the section on myths related to the Google Generation we find this myth:

They prefer quick information in the form of easily digested chunks, rather than full-text.

Our verdict: This is a myth. CIBER deep log studies show that, from undergraduates to professors, people exhibit a strong tendency towards shallow, horizontal, "flicking" behaviour in digital libraries. Power browsing and viewing appear to be the norm for all. The popularity of abstacts among older researchers rather gives the game away. Society is dumbing down.

Confidence level: high. (p. 19)

N.B. The Library does still have books (both in print and electronic formats). However, they cannot be read in four, or even eight, minutes.

It is 2008. Do you know where our library is?

On January 15, 2008 the library staff was given a tour of the new library under construction. The tour began in the area between the library and building A, where there will eventually be a sidewalk. Along the sidewalk there will be rain gardens to collect site water runoff. Both surface runoff and roof/downspout water will be slowed by the rain gardens to slow the rate at which water enters the city's system.

Inside the library we were able to see under the access floor. Air delivery from the mechanical room below the library will come heated from the geothermal system and be delivered through the access floor. There will be inherent cooling from the geothermal system, as well as heating, dependent on need -- much the way a heat pump system works in residential buildings.

The access floor will allow facilitate a kind of plug-n-play since the cabling under the access floor can be rerouted depending on need above floor level.

Spaces within the library are now discernible, although some spaces were only demarcated by a 2x4 on the access floor. It is easier now to visualize where the photocopy area, circulation desk, offices, library classroom, periodical reading area, etc. will be located.

The views from inside continue to be spectacular! The day was clear and we could see across the Strait of Juan de Fuca to Canada.

The projected completion date is July 2008.

Peninsula College Library 2.0 Meets Web 2.0

Peninsula College Library recently attended the Quarterly Library Instruction Roundtable, sponsored by the University of Washington Instruction & Information Literacy Working Group. The meeting took place Dec. 10, 2007 in the Allen Auditorium of the University of Washington Suzzallo Library. This is a brief first-hand report.

There were about 20 librarians in attendance. The meeting began with the presentation of three demonstrations. 1) screen casting of both product and concept tutorials, 2) a video of a library catalog concept tutorial, and 3) services for remote and online users.

SCREEN CASTING DEMONSTRATION
The product tutorials are point-of-use tutorials on subjects like “How to Use PubMed.” They can be linked to through a “Help” or “How To” tab on the library home page. Although these may duplicate vendor tutorials, they are customized with local features like “connecting to full text.”

Parts of concept tutorials, were presented. Concept tutorials include aids such as “Known Citation Searching,” “Finding Measurement Tools,” “Legal Research,” “Finding Drug Information,” etc. which are focused on a process involving the use of several different products.

VIDEO DEMONSTRATION
UW received a 21st Century Grant to buy video making equipment and they are using it to address conceptual problems, such as “What is a catalog?,” a video they produced using a 40’s/50’s style reminiscent of government training films, to add an element of humor.

SERVICES TO REMOTE AND ONLINE USERS
This presentation looked at library use of Web 2.0 and asked the questions: “Do librarians fit well in social networking? Do students want us there?” Instead of creating YouTube videos, FaceBook pages, blogs, wikis, etc. to attempt overt or covert library instruction, the suggestion was to involve students in active learning, for example the creation of movies on research skills.

SUMMARY OF SOME DISCUSSION POINTS

INTEGRATION
One especially relevant criticism voiced early in the discussion: This all seems piecemeal. There is no integration. There is no structure. We can only go so far marketing products with adlib stuff without a context. Knowing when and why to use a tool (or a library!) is as important as knowing how.

ASSESSMENT
How do you know students are using something? Are site meters and Google Analytics really providing us with significant feedback? To be effective, assessment should be embedded in courses where feedback mechanisms can be built in, such as student journaling of how they feel about IL (information literacy) components, whether learning styles are being addressed, etc. Discipline faculty can provide feedback to library faculty.

MISCELLANEOUS
Librarians can provide tools, organize the tools (indicating which are beginning level, which are useful for a certain problem, etc.), but… (and I quote)…: “The 50 minute library lecture is dead.”

There was some discussion of using course management systems, such as Moodle, to create a rich IL environment which includes videos, text, quizzes, chat rooms, etc. for distance learners.

Conclusory Note:
This meeting confirmed that Peninsula College is addressing the same issues that educational institutions in the I-5 corridor are addressing, with the same level of success. The Peninsula College Library is already Web 2.0-enabled with YouTube, MySpace, and Google blog presence and will soon (July 2008) have a new library instruction classroom to promote active learning using electronic and print resources.

New Library Periodical Reading Area

Here are the views from the outside and inside of the Library Periodicals Reading Area in the process of construction. The view from inside the Periodicals Reading Area looks out towards Canada across the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Opening of the new Library is scheduled for June 2008.

HIV and Dental Care Bibliography

HIV and Dental Care Bibliography contains citations for selected journal articles published in the ten year period from 1997 to 2006. The entries are arranged in reverse chronological order and come from Stanford's Highwire Press database at: http://highwire.stanford.edu The full-text of all the articles is available free of charge from Highwire.

Other open access archives with dental journals, such as PubMedCentral (PMC) and the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), are also listed.

What Can An Excellent Library Do For Student Learning?

What Can An Excellent Library Do For Student Learning? notes key research findings from the DEEP (Documenting Effective Educational Practice) Project and NSSE (National Survey of Student Engagement) research.

Some ways to promote academic challenge and greater student engagement are also noted. Critical terminology relating to the Peninsula College Library Mission statement is defined (definitions are from ODLIS-Online Dictionary for Library and Information Science), and the Library mission is compared to that of museums and archives, in light of Ranganathan's Fifth Law of Library Science: "A Library is a growing organism."

Olympic Peninsula Local Research in the Peninsula College Library

The Olympic Peninsula Local Research guide focuses on Clallam and Jefferson Counties and points to Web indexes, public libraries, and local government sources in the region. The guide suggests starting with the development of a search vocabulary which can be used to search catalogs and indexes.

Guide to Fisheries Resources in the Peninsula College Library

The Fisheries Resources guide contains selected titles providing examples of several different publication formats related to fisheries: bibliography, biography, manuals, encyclopedias, writing style guides, databases which index fisheries journals, etc.

Library Publishes Elwha River Dam Selected Bibliography

Be patient as loading the link may take some time.
This bibliography on the Elwha River Dam removal does not pretend to be comprehensive or exhaustive. It includes selected citations to publications about the Elwha River. Scholarly, peer-reviewed journal articles, government publications, books, popular magazine articles, unpublished works, theses, and audiovisual materials are included. A few works of history and poetry inspired by the Elwha River are included.

Web sites on the surface Web are mostly excluded, with a few local exceptions, such as the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe Elwha River Restoration Project Web site and the Olympic National Park Elwha River Restoration Web site. Newspaper articles are also not included.

Libraries, Archives, Museums, Ranganathan, and Me

Reading the book, Five Laws of Library Science (1931), by the father of Indian Library Science, S. R. Ranganathan, inspired me to become a librarian. Today, while thinking about the difference between libraries, museums, and archives, I recalled Ranganathan's Fifth Law of Library Science: A Library is a growing organism.

As we know, living organisms ingest, digest, and excrete. So do libraries. Acquisitions is ingestion, while information competency instruction is all about promoting good digestion. To remain responsive to curricular necessities a community college library is also constantly excreting, sanitarily called "deselection" (which used to be called "weeding"). Libraries are growing organisms.

Archives and museums ingest and digest but are less prone to excretion. According to ODLIS, the Online Dictionary of Library and Information Science, archives are about preservation. Archives preserve noncurrent records, usually in a repository like the photo of the Toronto archives above, in this post, for "their permanent historical, informational, evidential, legal, administrative, or monetary value." Museums are about "the preservation and display of collections of physical artifacts and specimens."

Archives and museums are needed and useful cultural institutions, but their emphasis on permanent preservation, as opposed to the Library's instrumental preservation, indicates they are serving an important purpose, but one different from the Library. Archives are not about circulating their collections to the public, to take home to further learning. Museums are not systematically organized to meet the information needs of a specific user population, the way academic libraries are.

The Peninsula College Library mission indicates a purpose more focused on intellectual digestion of information to promote student learning: "To serve the information needs of the students, faculty, staff and community in an environment that nurtures learning and fosters freedom of intellectual activity."

2007-2008 LMC Faculty Handbook Now Available

The 2007-2008 Library Media Center Faculty Handbook includes information on Information Competencies, Resource-Based Learning, Resource-Based Instruction, Electronic Database descriptions, and procedures related to collection development and circulation. An added bonus, absolutely free of charge, is the floor plan of the new Library which should be completed in June 2008.

Education Resources in the Peninsula College Library

The Education Resources guide provides links to external public domain Web sources, such as the National Center for Educational Statistics, but also points to sources not available to PC students on the Web, such as the 3-volume Encyclopedia of American Education available in the Library Reference section.

Botany Resources in Peninsula College Library

The new Botany Resources page includes sample titles related to botany in these formats:

ENCYCLOPEDIAS AND DICTIONARIES
BOTANY MANUALS AND GUIDES
E-JOURNALS

as well as links to these resources:

LIBRARY CATALOGS
PUBLIC LIBRARY RESOURCES
SELECTED WEBSITES
INTERLIBRARY LOAN REQUEST FORMS
CRITICAL EVALUATION OF INFORMATION
WRITING STYLEBOOKS
SOURCE DOCUMENTATION IN THE SCIENCES

NLM Adds "Citing Medicine" to NCBI Bookshelf

In the 21st century, technological advances have created a whole new world of medical citations. To give authors, editors, medical librarians and others a guidebook for navigating that world, the National Library of Medicine is pleased to announce the publication of Citing Medicine: the NLM Style Guide for Authors, Editors, and Publishers, available free of charge on the NCBI Bookshelf.

Citing Medicine provides guidance for citing 26 types of published and unpublished material, ranging from print books and journal articles to blogs and wikis.
--from the NLM announcement of the 2nd edition, 2007.

Qualities of a Peninsula College Graduate

The Peninsula College Graduate will:

· utilize the processes, knowledge and values of scholarship.

· apply and connect knowledge in order to think critically and creatively.

· demonstrate bilingual proficiency in social and academic contexts.

· exemplify positive personal values.

· demonstrate the moral conscience and social responsibility of a proactive citizen.

· interact with the world recognizing and respecting multiple perspectives.

October 2007

Chemical Dependency Research Guide Now Available

The Chemical Dependency Research Guide provides broader, narrower, and related Library of Congress "Substance Abuse" search terms which can be used in searching the Online Catalog, WorldCat, and Library databases.

The Chemical Dependency Research Guide also lists a sample of 20 books (published between 2002 and 2007) in the Peninsula College Library collection and a selected list of full-text e-journals related to chemical dependency in Library databases.

Philosophy Resources in the Peninsula College Library

Peninsula College Library has an ample collection of materials related to philosophy. The Philosophy Resources guide at http://pc.ctc.edu/biblio/PF/philosophy.htm includes the following:

SELECTED BIOGRAPHIES
ENCYCLOPEDIAS
DICTIONARIES
GREEK PHILOSOPHY BOOKS
PHILOSOPHY E-BOOKS (A sample of aesthetics titles)
PHILOSOPHY E-JOURNALS (A sample of e-journal titles)
LIBRARY CATALOGS
INTERLIBRARY LOAN REQUEST FORMS
ONLINE RESOURCES IN THE PENINSULA COLLEGE LIBRARY
PUBLIC LIBRARY RESOURCES
QUALITY SURFACE WEB INDEXES
CRITICAL EVALUATION OF INFORMATION
SOURCE DOCUMENTATION: MLA, APA, AND CSE

BAS Applied Management Resource Guide Now Available

The first Bachelor of Applied Science in Applied Management students are now entering the new degree program (Fall 2007) and the Library has prepared for their arrival by acquiring print and electronic resources: books, encyclopedias, e-books, business databases, etc. The Library has also prepared a BAS Applied Management Resource Guide to help students get started in their research.

The Bachelor of Applied Science in Applied Management program at Peninsula College will enable students with AAS, AAS-T, AA-Transfer, and AS-Transfer degrees to combine their lower division technical or transfer preparation with upper division credits in business administration, resulting in a practical, application-oriented program. The BAS-Applied Management Program has been developed to meet the employment needs of the Olympic Peninsula.

The Library will do all it can to help students successfully complete their academic work.

Current Subscriptions to Nursing Journals (in Paper Copy) in the Periodicals Room

While the Library has dozens of nursing journals available in electronic format in Library databases such as Academic Search Premier and ProQuest, this list is of the current print subscriptions to nursing journals. These journals are available for browsing in the Library Periodicals Room or for check-out for one week.

Journal Name & Holdings
American Journal of Critical Care 2000-
American Journal of Nursing 5 years+
Critical Care Nurse 5 years+
Journal of Emergency Nursing 1999-
Journal of Nursing Scholarship 2000-
Journal for Specialists in Pediatric Nursing 2002-
Medsurg Nursing 2000-
Nursing Research 2003-
Reflections on Nursing Leadership 2000-

Updated Sept. 26, 2007

Research Guide to Music Resources in the Peninsula College Library

During a visit of Dr. Crabb's music theory class to the library a student requested a Music Research Guide.

The new Music Research Guide is available at: http://pc.ctc.edu/biblio/PF/music.htm

New Peninsula College Library Construction On Schedule

The new Peninsula College Library building is scheduled to be completed in June 2008. Library staff recently toured "inside" with the architect. The view toward the Strait of Juan de Fuca from the Periodical Reading Area should be spectacular!

Emergency Preparedness: An Opportunity for Quality Reading

This week Peninsula College faculty and staff, in coordination with local police and fire officials, have had fruitful discussions about personal responsibility and preparation for events (such as earthquakes, tsunamis, etc.) which might lead to the Olympic Peninsula becoming isolated.

In the event of being stuck with time on our hands -- with no electricity, telephone, internet, or television -- we will have an excellent opportunity for reading by natural light.

In our emergency preparedness discussions we have cited Maslow's hierarchy of needs, from physiological and safety needs up to self-actualization. Besides self-actualization Maslow also spoke of self-transcendence, and its general availability (see Maslow quote below). The canonic and classical spiritual literature can assist us in preparation for self-transcendence.

In addition to food, water, flashlights, medical supplies, etc., I would suggest we carefully choose some literature, from both the Eastern and Western spiritual classics. In our emergency preparedness efforts each of us may select different book titles: those we consider of most importance (actual or potential) for our own spiritual well-being.

Here are a few titles from my list:

EASTERN CLASSICS
The Conference of the Birds / Farid ud-Din Attar (1177)
The Analects / Confucius (c. 400 BCE)
The Dao De Jing / Lao Tzu (c. 400 BCE)
The Lotus Sutra (290)
The Mahabharata (400? BCE)
The Book of Mencius / Mencius (c. 330 BCE)
The Masnavi / Jalaluddin Rumi (c. 1250)
The Upanishads (1600? BCE)
etc.

WESTERN CLASSICS
The Little Flowers / St. Francis of Assisi
Interior Castle / St. Teresa of Avila
Dark Night of the Soul / St. John of the Cross
Imitation of Christ / Thomas a Kempis
The Practice of the Presence of God / Brother Lawrence
Revelations of Divine Love / Julian
The Journal of John Woolman / John Woolman
etc.


MASLOW ON SELF-TRANSCENDENCE
“I have recently found it more and more useful to differentiate between two kinds of self-actualizing people, those who were clearly healthy, but with little or no experiences of transcendence, and those in whom transcendent experiencing was important and even central… It is unfortunate that I can no longer be theoretically neat at this level. I find not only self-actualizing persons who transcend, but also non-healthy people, non-self-actualizers who have important transcendent experiences. It seems to me that I have found some degree of transcendence in many people other than self-actualizing ones as I have defined this term…” --- MASLOW, A. H. (1971). The farther reaches of human nature. New York, Viking Press.